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OR 



HUMAN NATURE IN A NUTSHELL. 



SOLUTION OF THE PROBLEM OF SELF-GO VERN3IENT BY 

THE PEOPLE, BY MAKING MONEY AND LABOR 

EQUIVALENT AND PvEGULATINO BOTH 

BY THE LAW OF SUPPLY 

AND DEMAND. 



By THOMAS E. COIN^N', Attorney-at-law 



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RICHMOND, YA. ?^ 

p. KEENAN'S STEAM PRIXTIXG PE^HSES. 

1880. 



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AEGUMENT. 



In order to determine what to do and how to do it, we must consider 
our nature, present condition, and probable future. The mental, moral, 
and physical inequality of men is self-evident. It is this which gives to 
society its existence, beauty, harmony, and perfection ; and a refinement 
of protection, commensurate with man's progress in the arts and sciences, 
adds the charms of grace and elegance. This inequality is probably 
man's natural condition, since history exhibits no instance of two men 
exactly alike. Were equality his natural condition, he would ever be 
instinctively impelled to attain it, and during the rise and fall of empires, 
the life and death of nations and races, the development and destruction 
of their literature, arts and sciences, must have regained it, or the race in 
its struo-crles become extinct. 

Absolute equality implies absolute perfection, whilst there can be no 
appreciable conception of a state or condition of society in which each 
individual was of the same size, color and form, possessed of the same 
knowledge and of the same facilities for acquiring it, of the same mental 
calibre, and consequently of the same desires, tastes and emotions. There 
would be no need of government where no one possessed either the power 
or inclination to injure. There could exist no society where all were 
equally self-sufficient, self-sustaining and independent. Man, in society, 
is the creature of circumstances, and is the architect of his own fortune 
only to the extent of his ability to mould, control, or select his surround- 
ings, neither of which can he possess at birth — a tiny mass of mental, 
moral and ph^^sical deformity, or beautiful development, as his parents 
have violated or observed the laws of health. In either event other influ- 
ence develops and directs his being. That his conscience is the creature 
of education, and as an absolute and infallible moral monitor has no ex- 
istence, the least learned and experienced of men have but to compare 
themselves and their neighbors to find it true that independent of education 
the word conveys no definite idea. Men are continually compouuding 
with their consciences, and perhaps but few have lived to whom the lines 
were not applicable — 

" Compauud for sins that we're inclined to, 
By damning those we have no mind to." 

Now, the sins that men are inclined to, differ as the multitude of con- 
sciences and conditions in life, ea,ch individual in each condition thanking 
God and himself that in some things, at least, he is not quite so bad as 
his neighbor. Thus man consoles himself for his imperfections, whilst he 
flatters his pride with many good intentions and some doubtful virtues. 



The world in its history has discovered no knowledge of human nature 
more profound than is contained in the single expression "Lead us not 
into temptation." Man has never, unaided, been able to resist sudden, 
unexpected, and powerful temptation. His nature has not changed since 
his creation. As man, he is the same, whether king or peasant, lord or 
vassal, gentleman or clown. The accidents of birth and fortune affect his 
manners and habits, not his nature. The rulers of men have eyer been 
and are to-day among the least obedient to the laws of God and man. A 
bigoted egotism and self-opinionated infallibilily is the too frequent off- 
spring of the elevation to petty authority of the grossly ignorant, sensual 
and vulgar, whose tj^rannical intolerance of opinion is invariably in pro- 
portion to their ignorance, as their merciless cruelty and oppression is 
only limited by their want of power. The mass of mankind are controlled 
and used, or governed and oppressed, through their ignorance and super- 
stition, by and for the benefit of their few intellectual superiors, as man, 
by his superior intelligence, controls the lower order of animals. That 
this truth meets a re&dy recognition, is evidenced by many trite vulgar- 
isms, in common parlance, which find their equivalent in all countries and 
in all languages. How familiar the expression: "The big fish eat the 
little ones." Without an important exception. State church and ^State 
have invoked each other's aid in controlling the people in peace and war, 
and for a like purpose — revenue and power. Church wars have been for 
the establishment, enforcement, or extension of dogmas — the church 
method of suppressing man's reason, destroying his independence, and 
commanding his obedience — nor has any State church ever failed to use 
force when emergency demanded and occasion occurred for its employ- 
ment, force of eloquence, interest, passion, diplomacy and force of arms, 
until, in the economy of Providence, Martin Luther and John Wesle}^ 
gave religious freedom to the civilized world ; and the different denomina- 
tions, whilst apparently antagonistic, are essential to and constitute the 
bulwark of civil and religious liberty. All other wars have been for 
accession to or acquisitioQ of the power to govern or control some portion 
of mankind ; and in all wars, no matter which party wins, the people do 
the fighting, bear the burdens, and suffer the loss, whilst their leaders reap 
the rewards, arrogate the honor and glory, and, when defeated, sustain but 
little loss, save the object of that ambition for which they have sacrificed 
the lives and property and desolated the homes of the people. Nearly 
2,400 3^ears ago, when, under the Valerian law, in the Republic of Rome, 
a condemned citizen had the right of appeal to the people, and the mass 
refused to enlist against Tarquin witliout a remission of their unjust in- 
debtedness to the nobility, a Patrician Senate usurped the power to ap- 
point a dictator, who dispensed with all law. About thirteen yesivs after, 
when the array joined the people in their demand, their debts were remit- 
ted, a paid standing arni}^ organized, and thencefortli libertj^ in Rome was 
known only in name ; and that name was an engine of destruction and 
cover for crime. 

Governments never voluntarily relinquish power, and never decrease 
taxation. Their tendency is to usurp the one and increase the other to 
the verge of bankruptcy and revolution. In all governments historj'' has 
repeated itself, in recording the exercise and exhaustion of human learn- 
ing and ingenuity in deceiving the masses as to the means and extent of 
usurpation, the mode and amount of imposition, and methods of collec- 
tion. To say that a people are free whose government possesses the un- 



limited power of taxation, is to say that the poor, illiterate, toiling slave 
owns and controls his wealth}'', learned, and powerful master. What 
availed the people's veto in Rome, when, impoverisned by government 
beyond the power of resistance, that government usurped the power to 
appoint a dictator who suspended all law ? — the same power exercised by 
Seward in America, Cromwell in England, and Buonaparte in France. 
And to-day, in such slight esteem is held the personal liberty of the citi- 
zen, that all over the land, every day of our lives, the officers of every 
petty corporation, in utter contempt of the most solemn constitutional 
guarantees for its protection and multiplied legislative enactments for its 
preservation, habitually violate it with impunity. To such degradation 
have the people been forced by bad government, that it is literally true in 
practice that the people have no rights which government and its officers 
are bound to respect. 

"Written constitutions require the instrumentality of men to enforce 
their provisions. Of what force and effect can they be if their interpre- 
tation be left to those men, since they must then speak the language of 
their interpreters, whose every interest, in the very nature of things, is 
the enlargement and extension of power, whilst the sole object of their 
authors is its limitation and restraint ? Fatal delusions to ensnare the 
masses, cunningly devised instruments admirably adapted to their oppres- 
sion and enslavement, the virtue and intelligence of the people have pre- 
served the small remnant of liberty we still possess, and not written con- 
stitutions, converted as they have been in the last twenty years, by dis- 
tortion and misconstruction, into the most powerful engines for the sup- 
pression of liberty, the destruction of law and order, extinction of virtue, 
and corruption of the people, b}' making crime honorable and truth abomi- 
nable, in order to maintain a partisan supremacy. They have taught 
America to realize, in the blood of two millions of her sons, and appre- 
ciate in the devastated homes of twelve millions of her people, the impo- 
tence, insignificance and imbecility of mere paper restraints upon power, 
and the facility with which, in the hands of the bold, daring, ambitious 
and corrupt partisan, by exciting the fears, inflaming the passions, and 
invoking the interest of the masses, they are converted into the most 
powerful and dangerous engines for their oppression. 

All rational action of mankind, whether as nations or individuals, finds 
a common origin in either real or mistaken self-interest. Hence the power 
vested in government should be absolutely fixed, and all construction 
avoided, by frequent and direct appeals to the people, in such manner as 
to avoid partisan and sectional interest or influence, and at the same time, 
by large concurrent majorities, secure the wisest and most patriotic action. 

Politics and religion are essentially intolerant. Their power should be 
limited to right sm# reason. To that end, partisan organization should be 
prohibited, and partisan association discouraged until abolished. No per- 
son should be eligible to office who represented any organized body of 
men, or who was brought forward by any caucus or convention. Then 
the intuitive philosoph};^ of the people will invariably indicate the men, 
prominent by peculiar qualification for position, and the operation of a 
common, unassociated, but aggregate judgment, will make the best selec- 
tions. The greatest danger to liberty has ever been from party, now de- 
generated into faction by the tempting spoils of office, under the immense 
patronage of the Federal executive, resulting from and based upon the 
power of unlimited taxation. Destroy this fountain-head of corruption, 



6 

and party disorganization must follow. Then parties will sustain their 
appropriate relation to government and the people, viz : earnest searchers 
after truth, efficient motors in the advancement and enlightenment of the 
whole people, by philosophical discussion of all questions touching their 
welfare, an honest expression of opinion upon measures of public policy, 
and association, by their common efforts, of the learning, wisdom and ex- 
perience of the whole people in the selection of the best men and methods 
for the administration of government. Then there will be no danger of 
over-taxation, because there will be neither temptation to nor object to be 
accomplished by it, where all are fully informed about and equally inter- 
ested in seeking the general welfare. Then money will be shorn of its 
fictitious and assume its true value — a labor representative. Then gov- 
ernment will address itself to affording the readiest and most rapid com- 
munication between the people, and the greatest facility for exchanging 
the product of their labor, the increase of which will rapidly become accu- 
mulated wealth. 

Let us discover where we are and whither we are tending, and by the 
light of experience we may best suggest what to do and how to do it. 
Our theory recognizes the people as sovereign, the constitution as next, 
the creature of the people, and government as third and lowest, being the 
creature of the constitution. Is this true in practice, or has the order 
become reversed, and the people servants of a government which has ab- 
sorbed all power ? The imperfection of human language renders the 
perfect conveyance of our ideas impossible, whilst the frailty of human 
judgment prevents the anticipation of and provision for all the emergen- 
cies which may occur amongst a new and great people. Hence the neces- 
sity for construction and application of constitutional law. How is that 
instrument, created by the people for the limitation and control of gov- 
ernment, construed, interpreted, and enforced ? By a government com- 
posed of the leaders of a successful party, representing sometimes a 
minority of the whole people, and not always commanding the respect 
and confidence of that ^minority ! Administration after administration 
have found the temptation to enlarge the powers of government by con- 
struction to be irresistible, until the constitution has become a great con- 
duit through which power flows to government absorption. The twenty- 
fifth section of the Judiciary Act, passed in 1789, enabled the government 
to absorb the entire power of the whole people, and the act of the od of 
March, 1833, authorizing the enforcement of the decisions of that govern- 
ment against the States or the people by the use of the arm}^ and navy, 
virtually centralized all power at Washington. The people gave to both 
of these unequivocally unconstitutional provisions their sanction by their 
silence, until upon occasion partisan strife, generating in and embittered 
by the rapid increase of executive patronage, consequent upon centraliza- 
tion of power, made internecine war possible. Until 1828 the conserva- 
tive element of the government was compromise. The essential and dis- 
tinguishing characteristic of true republics, acquiescence of the people in 
those two acts, gave them the force of law, changed the conservative ele- 
ment to force, and, leaving the Federal Government in possession of the 
unlimited power of taxation, party war became inevitable. That the late 
war was partisan and not sectional, is proven most conclusively by the 
conduct of the mass of the people of both sections. Until partisan su- 
premacy, upon the conclusion of the war, made sectional proscription a 
necessity, in many States union and disunion were convertible terms with. 



Republican and Democrat ; and now all over the land the people of both 
sections meet and fraternize as though no war had occurred, whilst all 
alike feel and suffer from its results. In all this silent, fatal change, have 
the people controlled the government as intelligent sovereigns ? or hav'^e 
they been controlled and misguided by it through its noiseless corps of 
sappers and miners, the Federal Supreme Court ? Can the people be said 
to vote, when their secret ballots are as secretly counted by a few govern- 
ment officials ? Does not the present manner of balloting open the flood- 
gates of fraud ? Have not the army and navy been used, in connection 
tion with executive patronage, to control two elections ? Has there been 
no contest about the use of the army to control a third ? Is this a demon- 
stration of popular sovereignty ? or an exhibition of slavery, in which the 
masses are controlled by every species of force, fraud and corruption, in 
the interest of their masters, the leaders of a party in power, miscalled 
government ? Never has the constitution been successfully invoked as a 
restraint upon the party in power. 

Where are we ? Living upon the verge of bankruptcy and revolution, 
under a government whose power is that of an absolute and irresponsible 
military despotism — a government of men whose wills are enforced by the 
army and navy against the States or people, as policy may dictate or 
occasion demand. Behold the virtue and purity, wisdom and dignity of 
that government in the Electoral Commission of 1876 ! The act consti- 
tuting it was void, because not within the province of ordinary legisla- 
tion — void, because Congress cannot delegate its political power to, nor 
authorise its exercise by, another body of men — void, because the exercise 
of other than judicial authority by the judiciary is repugnant to the letter 
and spirit of the constitution ; and our appreciation of judicial ermine 
would have suggested the resentment of indignant scorn, whilst blushing 
for shame at the disgrace of the nation. But the high commission deter- 
mined its constitutionality in its own favor, by a partisan vote for a par- 
tisan chief, to maintain a partisan supremacy, exercising their will mtd 
disregarding the law. With such combinations the Executive may re-elect 
himself at will, even in defiance of his own party. Are the people blind ? 
Where is the manhood of our native land ? Dare they not speak for their 
rights ? Why this ominous silence ? 'Tis the gathering elements of im- 
pending storm, portending the fate of a great nation for liberty or impe- 
rialism. Does history furnish no example of bold and decisive strokes of 
executive usurpation ? Is Cromwell forgotten ? Napoleon ? the Oran- 
gerie ? the 18th Brumaire ? Can you believe that a President, placed in 
office by Grant's army and the High Commission, is not now dispensing 
the hundreds of millions of Federal patronage and disposing the army 
and navy to secure his party in power ? and, if necessary, will he not 
resort to the same means by which he acquired it ? With the charges 
against him, will not the instinct of self-preservation, aided by every per- 
sonal and partisan ambition, impel him to use all the means that may con- 
tribute to success ? Have we not abundant signs of revolution, either of 
opionion or arms, by which there will be a change of government and not 
merely its administration ? With judicial legislation, executive patronage 
and prerogative, congressional usurpation and subserviency, universal ex- 
travagance and corruption in government, and a corresponding impover- 
ishment, depression and demorilization of the people, does not necessity 
imperatively demand it ? Are we not tending to the concentration of all 
power in one man ? Have we not almost reached that condition ? With 



8 

what prophetic vision are we warned by Washington in his farewell address 
of that partisan supremacj^ in which some leader, more fortunate or more 
daring than the rest, may grasp the power to establish his throne upon 
the ruins of his country's liberty. Is General Grant's European tour, 
with his history, his known ambition of and ability to use power, his 
almost unexampled popularity with the dominant part}^ without signifi- 
cance ? Were his magnificent receptions by crowns, powers and princi- 
palities the voluntary tributes of homage to his greatness, or were they 
procured b}^ his diplomacy ? Does Europe welcome the principles of Re- 
publicanism, to the destruction of her thrones ? or does she recognize the 
fatal tendency of our institutions, and greet a future chief ? 

The hope for relief is not in a change of parties, however much frequent 
changes may assist the well-directed efforts of the people ; but of govern- 
ment, which must be deprived of that money power by which it now con- 
trols the people and their commerce, by limiting its power to tax in 
amount and purpose, and confining its levies to sums in gross upon the 
States, and its appropriations to items. All legislation must go back to 
the people for ratification or rejection, including declarations of war. In 
this there can be no inconvenience, since all wars have ever been and ever 
will be discussed for years before their actual occurrence. Congress 
should sit but once in ten years, and government be so reformed as to 
become a local, self-government of the people, as simple as their wants, 
with which it must be commensurate, and familiar as their daily walks of 
life. 

The wisest and best government can neither control remotely delegated 
power, nor correct its manifold abuse. Productive of unmeasured wealth, 
it is increased and sustained by its ill-gotten gains, and grows and fat- 
tens by mere neglect. 

The Federal Government is at Washington, and not of nor with the 
States nor the people, to whom it is a mysterious stranger and alien 
enemy, occupying its time and the learning, talent and experience of its 
officials in devising ways, means and expedients by which to extort from 
the people the largest amount of the product of their labor, without actu- 
ally destroying their industries and forcing them by sheer destitution into 
open rebellion ; and by the corrupt use of this immense revenue its will 
permeates everywhere, from the State Legislature to the town council. 
To keep the people in subjection, it has filled the land with a multitudi- 
nous swarm of officials, spies, informers, abandoned and adventurous, 
moral, social, religious and political prostitutes, who annoj^, harrass, dis- 
turb and foment, whilst they eat up the substance of the people ; but 
blinded by avarice, enfeebled by luxurious indulgence to effeminac}'', and 
drunk with the power of an absolute and irresponsible military despotism, 
it has exercised the power of unlimited taxation for the aggrandizement 
of its creatures, parasites and dependents, to the almost entire absorption 
of the surplus product of labor, until impoverished to starvation, the 
whole people are organizing for Revolution ! ! ! Not change of parties 
nor administration, but of government, thorough, efficient, and funda- 
mental. 

Government, the apparent source of all power, profit and honor, the 
object of every low and mean ambition, is corrupting the youth of the 
country by its ever-present and all-powerful force of example, until 
another decade may consign the morality with the liberty of this people 
to eternal oblivion. Change is inevitable. It is but a question of time 



9 

ichen one man will be absolute master of the lives and fortunes of the 
American people, unless the change for liberty comes at once. Govern- 
ment cannot be perfected in a decade, nor indeed in a century, but its 
present evil tendency can be arrested, and a government of the people 
inaugurated, which will forever remain with them, inseparable, indestruc- 
tible, and incorruptible. Its inauguration will commence when the peo- 
ple, regardless of party, unite in the firm and fixed determination to vote 
for no man for any office, no matter how insignificant, unless that man be 
Identified with them in interest, united to them by all the ties of a com- 
mon social sympathy, solemnly pledged and thoroughly devoted to the 
following reform : That government establish a stable and uniform cur- 
rency, the volumn of which shall be regulated alone by the law of supply 
and demand, making that currency true money, a medium of exchange 
always representing substantially as much labor as any commodity for 
which it will exchange, having an indestructible value, susceptible of 
neither enhancement nor depreciation by government. 

Whilst the precious metals have mainly, in all ages and all countries, 
constituted the medium of exchange, because, as labor products, they 
have ever been and ever will be most truly representative of actual mental 
and manual labor, yet they sustain only a proportion of one per cent, to 
commercial requirement, and other values must be* created to supply the 
demand. With every confidence in the wisdom of the people, and in- 
voking its exercise, my plan is submitted. In order that the people may 
develop to the fullest extent all their industrial resources and become 
locally independent, the coinage of gold and silver should be unlimited. 
The treasury of each State should constitute a Federal sub-treasury, with 
convenient additional depositories throughout the State, and sufficient 
mints for the reduction and coinage of jewels, plate and bullion. Let 
each citizen who desires the use of money deposit in one of these govern- 
ment depositories coin, jewels, plate or bullion at their coin value, in the 
proportion of one to three, and security on unincumbered real estate at 
its lowest contingent cash value, in double the amount of the other two, 
and receive in Federal treasury bills, payable in coin and receivable for 
all dues to government, three dollars for each one of deposit, paying on 
the two borrowed interest at the rate of three per cent, per annum, limit- 
ing the rate of interest on private loans to six per cent. Then will the 
wealth of the country be always disseminated amongst the masses, whose 
labor produces it — the coin retained in the country, because those bills 
will, in the nature of things, be at par throughout the entire commercial 
world. Then no combination of capitalists can embarrass government, 
because the precious metals will be almost exclusively deposited in its 
vaults, nor the people, because they will control the means by which the 
product of their labor is exchanged. Then will the affectionate devotion 
of the citizens to their government be unalterable, because directly iden- 
tified with and attached to it by the ever-present and indissoluble ties of 
real and permanent self-interest. Then will monopolies, with which 
the country is now flooded, the markets and railways controlled and 
and the people robbed, die of their own inherent corruption. Then will 
money be cheapened to its true value, and no longer, by unholy worship, 
be made the source and cause of every ill. Then will labor, mental and 
mannual, attain its true dignity and independence, and money and labor 
sustain to each other their natural and equivalent relation — the creature 
and equal, as representive, of its creator. Then will there never be un- 



10 

earned and unjustly accumulated wealth in the hands of the few, by which 
the many can be oppressed. Then will the current life-blood of the nation 
permeate to each hovel in the land, and warm into life the frozen hearts of 
suffering millions, infusing vigor into labor, furnishing abundant, suitable, 
and profitable employment to all. Then, blessed with abundant pros- 
perity, universal peace and good will, we will no longer hear applied to 
our land the terrible truth : 

"111 fares the land to hastening ills a prey, 
Where wealth accumulates and men decay." 

Then will our great highways be owned and controlled by the commerce 
along their lines for its own increase and development, and not, as now, 
for the impoverishment of great sections to enrich the few. Then will 
every resource in all this broad land meet its fullest development, new 
roads be built, new farms be opened, towns and cities spring up as if by 
magic, and the busy hum of manufactories, fully adapted to all our wants, 
be heard in every hamlet in the land. Then, indeed, will every county in 
every State be locally self-sustaining and independent. Producing all 
things necessary for home consumption, and much that other nations need, 
we will bring to us much of the wealth and most desirable population of 
the Old World. Then will our national debt, that bane of liberty which 
sooner or later reduces the people of every nation to serfdom, be easily 
and rapidly extinguished, and a contingent fund accumulated sufficient 
to carry on any ordinary war without materially crippling our industries 
or increasing taxation. 

The gold and silver coin and bullion in the world is about equal, and is 
estimated at eleven thousand millions. The circulation of France is sev- 
enty dollars for each person. We would require more, but taking that as a 
basis, we will require about thirty-five hundred millions for circulation. 
Now, as our circulation would increase gradually, as the increased pro- 
duction of the people increased the demand, it is fully safe to say that in 
five years the government vaults would contain one thousand millions of 
coin deposit, and receive interest upon two thousand millions, which, at 
three per cent., would be sixty millions yearly. Add twenty millions for 
customs above expenses, and taking twenty years as the average occur- 
rence of a three 3'^ears' war, and we have sixteen hundred millions with 
which to carry it on, an amount amply sufficieht in such a country, with 
its currency at par the world over, transportation and supplies abundant 
and cheap, to support an army of a million of men for four years, because, 
by this sj^stem of financiering, taxation will necessarily become limited, 
fixed and uniform ; and no material enhancement or depreciation of values 
can ever occur, either in peace or war, except those necessarily incident 
to production and consumption, and this could not materially affect values, 
because where one industry was crippled by war another would be corres- 
pondingly stimulated in a self-sustaining country. 

In a country possessing all the elements of prosperity, the people are 
prosperous, independent and happy just in proportion to the facility with 
which they can exchange the product of their labor. To this end money 
should be abundant and cheap as labor, whose product it must ever be ; 
and this the system suggested procures, whilst, at the same time, it pre- 
yents any considerable fluctuation in, and establishes the most perfect and 
invariable standard of values. Let us, then, by every effort hasten its 



11 

adoption, and make the people masters of their own time, their own labor, 
and their own money, and thus acquire the only safe means of self-govern- 
ment ; for that government which controls the money of its people is ab- 
solute in power, no matter b}'- what name its form may be distinguished. 
That people cannot long remain either free, prosperous or happy, who own 
neither their own time nor labor. Having established a government of 
the people, we will preserve it bj'' making it local, just sufficient for the 
wants of the people, placing its officers beyond the reach of temptation, 
and making them directly responsible to their constituents. To this end, 
each State should be divided into an odd number of counties, each con- 
taining as nearly as possible the same amount of population, each county 
into an odd number of townships, each township into an odd number of 
precincts, each precinct to contain no more than two hundred and fifty 
voters, each voter casting three votes viva voce ; thus preventing loss of 
time from business by attendance at the polls, making fraudulent returns 
impossible, by the certainty and facility with which each voter may learn 
the true condition of the polls ; securing confidence, reducing excitement 
to its minimum, and procuring a minority representation for protection 
against the recklessness, extravagance, imprudence, improvidence, and 
oppression of majorities. In precinct elections a majority should control ; 
in the township, a majority of precincts, each casting one vote ; in the 
county, a majority of townships ; in the State, a majority of counties ; in 
Federal elections, a majority of States, each, like the precinct, casting one 
vote. Government should commence in the precinct, which would provide 
for its own schools and roads, vote its own levies, collect and appropriate 
them, and govern itself in all things pertaining to its own welfare. So of 
the townships, counties and States, each exercising the smallest amount 
of government consistent with the general welfare. The power of direct 
taxation should exist only in the precinct, and be exercised and enforced 
by it alone. When the people ratify the legislative estimate, the State 
will issue her requisition upon the counties for a sum in gross, the coun- 
ties upon the townships, and they upon the precincts. Thus all the peo- 
ple may know what is collected and how appropriated — bringing govern- 
ment home to the people, simplifying and familiarizing the people with it, 
to whom it is now a strange myster}^ AYho to-day can read and become 
familiar with the multitudinous and voluminous yearly reports of govern- 
ment officials, unless he be a man of learning and wealth, and devote his 
whole time to that purpose ? How often do the oldest members of Con- 
gress call for important reports, with which they unhesitatingly announce 
themselves unfamiliar, and then what grave and learned discussion as to 
what they mean and what they do not ? Can that be called a government 
of the people, or for their benefit, of which they know nothing, except as 
master and tax-gatherer, and whose main object they see and feel to be 
the extortion from them of the greatest possible amount of money for the 
aggrandizement of the officials who compose it, and the monopolies, 
cliques and rings by which they are kept in office ? There are in every 
town, county and State in America massive brains and giant intellects 
equal, with equal opportunites, to any the world has ever produced. Let 
there be a local self-government of the people, and by operation of natural 
law there will be the highest physical, moral and intellectual development 
of the people. Thus make the demand, and the response will be as 
prompt and vigorous as the result will be wonderful and efficient. There 
will be the ever-present example of one precinct to another for emulation 



12 

or improvement. In county, town and State there will be the ripest, rich- 
est school of learning and experience, where the pride of true, manly in- 
dependence, womanly modesty, purity and virtue, self-love, self-interest, 
all that can prompt human action, would impel to combination every men- 
tal, moral and physical power for the achievement of the grandest, most 
glorious results — the happy solution of the problem of self-government. 
As the husband and father recognized that the general government com- 
menced in the precinct, and that the general welfare depended upon it for 
its excellence, he would appreciate that the origin of social government 
was in the family, upon which society must depend for its purity, and that 
the origin of family was in the individual, he would thus be impelled bj'' 
his affection, his reason, and his desire for happiness, to teach each mem- 
ber by his example that true happiness is to be found only in habits of 
virtue, and the greatest amount of enjoyment derived from temperate in- 
dulgence of the natural appetites, tastes, desires and emotions ; and 
whilst teaching them to rely upon and govern themselves, he would re- 
move temptation by abolishing those gilded dens of vice now fostered, 
enriched, and rendered magnificently attractive by the reckless extrava- 
gance and corruption of our present system of central governments. The 
saloon, with its variety of games and vicious amusements ; the variety the- 
atre, with its lascivious ballet and immoral exhibitions, so attractive to 
and seductive of youth, would soon be things of the past. 

All officers should be elected by the people ; their salaries be fixed, and 
the office without emolument. Every fee should go into the precinct, 
county, town, State, or Federal treasury, and a record kept for public in- 
spection, showing when, by whom, and for what service paid. Each mem- 
ber of the State and Federal legislature should have his salary fixed by 
his constituency, and it should be paid by them. Each district should 
elect two, so that any considerable minority would always be protected 
by representation. For instance, a district contained thirty thousand 
voters, twenty thousand of whom belonged to one party and ten thousand 
to another ; then the poll would stand thirty thousand to sixty thousand, 
and each would elect one representative, and the majority could not divide 
their vote so as to elect both. Majorities of more than two-thirds are too 
large, and minorities of less than one-third are too small to make oppres- 
sion either probable or profitable. Members of Congress should be im- 
peachable by their constituency, and triable before a court of pardons and 
impeachments sitting in their own State as a part of its government. 
Then there will be no miscellaneous appropriation bills, squandering mil- 
lions of the people's money in profligate extravagance and electioneering 
schemes. The State Legislature should estimate the amount necessary to 
support the State government two years in advance, apportioning the same 
amongst the counties according to wealth and population. So, in like 
manner, the counties and towns, the whole to be submitted to the people 
twelve months before the election for ratification, amendment or rejection. 
Customs would then support the Federal Government, and leave a surplus 
of more than twenty millions yearly ; thus abolishing the odious internal 
revenue system, with its immense standing arm}^ of government depend- 
ants. Values would become fixed, so slight would ever be their variation 
in peace or war, and all business could be safely and profitably conducted. 

The President should be elected by the States, each casting one vote, 
the people voting directly as in other elections ; the Vice-President by tlie 
Senate. The President should appoint, by the advice and consent of the 



13 

Senate, all foreign representatives, and no other officers. All Federal 
commissions should be in the name and by authority of the people of the 
United States, and attested by the President and the secretary of that 
department to which the office belongs. The Cabinet and heads of beau- 
reaux should be elected by the whole people, no two of whom should be 
from the same State ; and, to secure their efficiency, should hold office 
during good behavior, impeachable by Congress, who should fix their 
salary. They should appoint their own clerks and laborers. Postmasters 
should be elected by the people, and, for convenience, postal districts 
should be established. The Postmaster-General should regulate their 
offices under a general law. Officers of the navy, above the rank of mid- 
shipman, should be elected by Congress from the navy or naval schools. 
Officers of the army, above the rank of colonel, should be elected by Con- 
gress from the army or militarj^ schools ; below that, appointed by the 
general commanding on the recommendation of brigade, division and corps 
commanders, except volunteers, whose officers should be elected by com- 
panies, regiments, brigades, divisions and corps, and commissioned by the 
Governor of the State to which the troops belong, commanding thereby 
the most essential of all things in war, the confidence of the soldiery. 

Each State should be represented by one judge on the Federal supreme 
bench, elected by the Legislature of his own State, his salary fixed by 
Congress, but paid by his State, impeachable by the Legislature of his 
own State. This court should sit as a court of errors, appeals, impeach- 
ments, and pardons. It is dangerous to give political bodies jurisdiction 
of impeachments : their divided and shifting responsibility more inclines 
to license crime than correct abuse of power by a favorite. And the 
frailty of human nature warns us to remove from the executive the dan- 
gerous temptation to veto and pardon. There should be no veto but the 
will of the people. The judges of the Supreme Court should be triable, 
upon impeachment, before a court composed of the chief justices of all 
the States, with the right of appeal upon law, not fact, to the Federal Su- 
preme Court. Upon the construction or interpretation of constitutional 
law, an appeal should lie from the Supreme Courts, State and Federal, 
directly to the people. Then every line and letter of our constitutions 
will become familiar to and receive a certain fixed and well-defined mean- 
ing by the people. Then the people will be sovereign in fact. Then 
organic law will mean something. Then change will be contemplated with 
holy horror, until demonstrated by well-established, experimental facts as 
absolutely necessary or highly beneficial. Then government will have 
stability, and the people become firmly attached to its institutions, as wis- 
dom, purity and virtue aid both to mould for each other the most excellent 
and perfect character of which man and his institutions are susceptible. 
Then will the facility for frequent change at great expense, requiring mul- 
tiplicity of legislation to carry them into effect, embarrassing the people 
and endangering their liberties by the uncertainty and obscurity of the 
law, be effectually abolished. 

Without organization resistance to a usurper would be hopeless. 
Patrick Henry said "your militia would turn against you;" and such is 
human nature and the present condition of affairs, that when called out, 
goaded by fear upon the one hand and induced by the certainty of reward 
on the other, I believe they would. Congress has but to pass an act 
making it a misdemeanor to write or speak of a Federal officer in such a 
manner as would be calculated to impede or embarrass him in the dis- 



14 

charge of his duty, to complete the subjugation of the people and fill the 
measure of government despotism. It is punishable as contempt for the 
press to publish anything " calculated to impede or embarass the adminis- 
tration of justice," and the court interested construes the language, de- 
termines its effect, tries the offender without a jury, and iflicts the punish- 
ment. 

Let the people organize reform clubs all over the land, demandinoj that 
government be divested of that money power by which they are now so 
unnaturally oppressed, and that it remain with the commerce of the peo- 
ple, where it naturally and justl}^ belongs, and thej'^ will be heard and felt 
by government as the tremulous, rumbling thunderis of the earthquake. 
Make this the issue and key-note of the next Presidential campaign, and 
the heavy hand of oppression, now o'ershadowing the land with its gloom, 
will disappear as the mist before the morning sun. 



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